


to cultivate dew-coated flowers

by asterions



Category: Granblue Fantasy (Video Game)
Genre: Declarations Of Love, F/F, Language of Flowers, Mischief, Relationship Discussions, Romantic Fluff, Slow Dancing, Wedding Planning
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-11-17
Updated: 2018-11-17
Packaged: 2019-08-22 10:37:29
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,266
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16596251
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/asterions/pseuds/asterions
Summary: When Katalina and Vira announce that they're getting married, Yggdrasil, like everyone else on the Grandcypher, gets sucked into the wedding planning.But where is Rosetta?





	to cultivate dew-coated flowers

**Author's Note:**

  * For [ackermanx](https://archiveofourown.org/users/ackermanx/gifts).



> erin read their side stories so they could spark for zooey so i'm going to stop being a coward and finally write yugusetta, was the promise. no promises on quality, but i'm here to deliver anyway! 
> 
> there are spoilers for the granblue main story chapter 54, and allusions are made to the second arc chapters 98-99, but there are no spoilers for then!
> 
> title is derived from the four character idiom 露地栽培, or rojisaibai!

“Congratulations on your wedding!”  
  
Yggdrasil hears it as soon as she’s out the door, so she gently floats around the corner towards its source. Her toes graze the floor, and she’s glad she makes nary a sound as she successfully creeps up behind Vane and impulsively crawls her cold fingertips across his open back to the base of his ear.  
  
He yelps, throwing his papers in the air as his knees buckle and arms jut out in improbable directions.

 

Turning around, he sighs with whole-bodied relief. “What, Yggdrasil, it’s just you! No Rosetta or Lyria today?”

 

She shakes her head, bells clamoring, and that’s when she notices that he was talking to Katalina, who’s currently catching the papers that drift to the floor. With a casual brush of the documents, she hands the file back to Vane in neat order.

 

Yggdrasil shakes Vane’s shoulder and gestures questioningly to Katalina. Vane looks at her for a second, until he comes to a realization. “Oh, yeah! Katalina’s getting married to—wait, I should let her say it!”

 

Katalina shifts at the pressure placed on her by two pairs of innocent eyes, and looks away, a finger scratching her cheek. “Ah, yes… I am getting married soon,” she notes absently, and the look of her face is one of something approaching bewilderment to Yggdrasil.

 

She empathizes. Sometimes, when she looks at Rosetta, she struggles to believe that such a wonderful person is real.

 

“...to Vira,” she manages to get out, and shy giddiness overtakes her in a full blush. Yggdrasil is reminded of the fruits in her forest that start out slightly pink and gradually ripen to an attractive cherry red, deciding that’s an accurate analogy for the state of Katalina’s face right now.

 

Yggdrasil rushes over to her and holds her hands, feeling the warmth seep into her, and flowers sprout around them. Vane’s boots are overtaken by vines, and he trips yet again, holding the documents close to his chest..

 

“H-Help!” he cries, and Lancelot and Lyria appear to assist them.

 

Yggdrasil gets a scolding about controlling her powers, since she’s a primal with all that it entails. But Lyria’s eyes catch the pink roses Yggdrasil sprouted in her burst of joy, and she lights up.

 

“Hey, Katalina! You think she could help Lennah with the flower arrangements?”

 

Katalina looks back into her innocent gaze, wavering. “Vira… does love flowers.”

 

Lyria clamps Katalina’s hand with a certain vigorosity that Yggdrasil can’t quite name. An image surfaces, a devil’s bony hand clasping a human’s with an ominous, theatrical voice. _The deal is sealed._

 

Yggdrasil laughs and everyone turns to look, but she makes no effort to explain.  


＊

 

“Oh my? You’re little miss Yggdrasil? How very nice to meet you!”

 

Yggdrasil wants to say, actually, she’s at least 500 years old, which at the very least makes her 18.518 times as old as she is, and she can rise to become at least 50 feet tall, if not more, but she instead pouts with puffy cheeks in retaliation. Lyria wouldn’t like it if she spontaneously tore through the ceiling to achieve that specific height, after all.

 

Lennah pays no mind to her expression, and Yggdrasil, ever the observer, surmises that either she is so simple she doesn’t notice, or she doesn’t simply _wish_ to notice.

 

Well, her presence is healing, so she’ll forgive her for now. Those who treat nature kindly will always be her allies. And when she hands over a brilliantly vibrant camellia, her opinion of her soars even more.

 

“This is the flower the little lady likes the most,” she says of the red flower full of life, and then takes out some more. There are also yellow camellias, which are to be expected, and forget me nots, carnations, daffodils, azaleas. All very good choices, Yggdrasil thinks, if a bit traditional for humans.

 

She wills a morning glory in her hand, and then mimes weaving it in a circular motion, then points to the entryway.

 

Lennah’s eyebrows perk up, and she places a hand to her cheek. “Ooh my, oh dear! That’s a wonderful idea, sweetie. It would make their promise all the more meaningful if they were to stand under these at the altar, wouldn’t it? I’ll make some right away.”

 

She can’t help but feel awe at the ease at which Lennah produces spirit blooms, so in an awe-inspiring feat of maturity Yggdrasil produces more, trying to match her pace.

 

When Rackam comes back, he’s assaulted by piles and piles of petals, screaming all the while as he wades through them, and Lennah winces ever so slightly.

 

“Ah, oh dear, we might have overdone it.”

 

Yggdrasil agrees, but she privately thinks his irritated face is hilarious. So she takes Lennah’s hand and they hide out in the engine room.

 

“Noa,” Rackam calls out. “Did you see any of the flower girls here?”

 

The storage closet rattles with Yggdrasil’s muffled laughter, and Noa smiles kindly. “I haven’t seen anyone but you today, Rackam.”

 

“Really,” he says, scratching his chin. “Don’t overwork yourself, okay? Just come get lunch with me in an hour or so.”

 

“Sure,” Noa replies easily, and when he’s a safe distance away he tells them, “You can come out now.”

 

Yggdrasil and Lennah burst out of the much-too-small storage closet. Lennah stretches as Yggdrasil picks up some items that fell out with them. “Thank you for saving us, dear Noa! And do tell us how your lunch date goes later!”

 

“Will do,” he says with a beam, returning his attention to the blueprints.

 

  
＊  
  


Io, coaxed by the ever-supportive Lyria, shyly approaches her when she’s sipping some hot chocolate by the fireplace.

 

Lyria calls out to her. “Yggdrasil! No Rosetta today?”

 

Yggdrasil shakes her head, then slumps. Ever since this wedding planning business, she hasn’t seen her at all. She resolves to find her when she has a chance, and Io looks at her like she might know something.

 

“Then who’s the other cup for,” Io asks, but with a nudge from Lyria, she changes topic. “Wait, that’s not important! Yggdrasil, do you have a dress?”

 

Yggdrasil points to herself. It might not be clothing in the strictest sense of the word, as everything on her body is grown, but it is meant to cover her body, and as such serves the purpose of clothing. Fabric like cotton is still made from nature, after all.

 

Despite that, she gets many eyes on her, but it's far more likely because she’s a walking Primal rather than anything else.

 

Io pouts, tiny fists curling inwards. “No! For the wedding, you need a special dress, the kind that ladies wear! Lyria, you should have told her!”

 

Lyria holds a hand to her mouth. “I’m sorry! I didn’t think of it!”

 

“That’s what you always say!”

 

Yggdrasil has to hold herself back from running away, because as she learns more about humans, she learns of their peculiar behaviors like play-fighting, saying things that look mean but aren’t really _what they mean_. Her relationship with Rosetta isn’t like that, and she prefers it that way. Since she can’t use words, Rosetta can never lie to her.

 

So Io and Lyria are not fighting, and there’s no need for her to be so anxious. But the matter they’re talking about seems to be somewhat impending, she thinks as they turn eyes on her.

 

“Come with us, Yggdrasil! You want to look pretty for Rosetta, right?”

 

Before Yggdrasil could tell them that there would hardly a point to it when Rosetta would always find her pretty, she’s being dragged off by two sets of arms and can barely look back at the other, fuller mug abandoned on the table.

 

When she comes back to the common room, her hair in disarray and exhausted from standing still for multiple fittings, she’s relieved to know that the mug is gone.

 

So Rosetta did take it after all. Yggdrasil feels content knowing that, at least.

  
＊  
  


Just as Yggdrasil is about to escape from her own mortal-sized body in protest of all the pinching and prodding for dress alterations, the bride herself walks into the room.

 

Or well, one of them. Vira is clearly frazzled, normally perfect hair standing on end (likely because of the humidity from outside) and her posture hunched, stilting.

 

This means nothing good. She can already feel Luminiera’s latent frustration as she snaps out orders and Dorothy and Claudia scamper to take them, having been assigned under her delegation by a much too free-spirited Captain as they go off to that one primal-infested island yet again.

 

“And you,” she says, focusing her eyes on Yggdrasil. “You’ve been resisting fittings and making needles and cloth disappear, haven’t you.”

 

Yggdrasil squirms, she’ll admit to being guilty of that, but it’s not her fault these dresses are so hard to wear!

 

Rather than continue her anger, though, Vira simply flops into a chair, and Luminiera emerges in sprite form, wrapping itself around her protectively. Yggdrasil emits a pleasant scent to try and calm her down further, since she looks tired.

 

She wants to ask a question, before remembering that she’s not quite capable of proper language just yet. Yggdrasil looks to Lyria, who cuts in on her behalf.

 

“Oh, Vira! She’s asking you why you wanted to marry Katalina in the first place, if it’s so stressful!”

 

“I know,” she mutters, “Luminiera told me.” Yggdrasil is impressed at that level of communication from someone who isn’t Lyria, and quietly re-evaluates her. For as long as she has lived, it is a wonder to her that there is more to learn every day. Why didn’t she go out into the world earlier?

 

As soon as she asks this question, she has the answer. It’s because of Rosetta, because it always is. She needs little else in this world so long as she has her, so when Rosetta took off, she was sure to follow. Lyria and most of the non-primal members of the crew will eventually grow old and die. She’s seen it many, many times before, and she’ll see it again.

 

Maybe someday, that rule will be defied, maybe a human will become a monster or technology will finally go much too far. But that won’t happen for many years, she thinks, so she’ll ask for the answers while she still can.

 

Vira clears her throat. “Stress… is hardly important. I would do anything for my beloved Katalina, after all. But sometimes, I feel as if it’s my penance. Because I do not deserve the pleasure of marrying her, after all. Why would she choose someone like me?”

 

But she stands up a little straighter in her chair, and Yggdrasil can feel her answer before she speaks it. “But those sorts of thoughts are irresponsible of me. I chose Katalina as much as she chose me. I am worthy of her love and affection, as well as her sadness. We can get through any difficulty if we’re together. She’ll be there for me, no matter what, and I’ll do the same for her. Wedding planning can bring it on any time,” she says.

 

Vira smiles, genial but icy. “Also, not that I’m not grateful for you asking such a thoughtful question, but did you really think you could get out of dress fitting with a question like that?”

 

Yggdrasil screams internally as the pins descend upon her yet again.

 

＊

 

 

Io sits next to Yggdrasil, furrowing her eyebrows at what she’s nibbling at. “Where did you get that,” she asks cautiously.

 

Yggdrasil continues eating happily, completely deaf to the world. Io comes so close to her that they are practically nose to nose. “Really, ever since you’ve been able to consume solid food, you’ve been eating non stop! Don’t primals worry about gaining weight?”

 

Yggdrasil looks at her with the most strange look she could. Mortals aren’t the same as primals, nor do they get their energy from the same sources. Eating was more of a luxury, really.

 

Io moved to take the bowl, so Yggdrasil grew a few feet in order to keep it well out of her reach. “Did you steal that from the kitchens? You know we’re not supposed to know the dishes yet!”

 

Yggdrasil shrugged, this Erune guy just gave it to her after stuttering rapidly and running away.

 

But the next moment, Vane appeared from behind the curtain partition. “It’s fine, it’s fine! Let her enjoy it. Oh, by the way. Something’s different been left for you on the house.”

 

Yggdrasil perks up as something sweet-looking is deposited in front of her: it’s a dirt cup, with a handful of raspberries and a mint leaf surrounding one bright pink icing-shaped rose.

 

“Enjoy!” Vane says, beaming even though he wasn’t the one who made it. Yggdrasil stares at it for a while, as if it would suddenly sprout wings and fly. When it doesn’t, she takes the spoon offered to her and digs in.

 

It’s perfectly moist and none too sweet, except for the icing. Yggdrasil finishes it within seconds, and misses the loss of it.

 

This dessert, like Rosetta, is rarely there anymore; still around but only around as the faintest trace of perfume lingering in their shared bed, warmth fading around unmade sheets that meet the cold winter air.

 

Yggdrasil can’t feel her through their bond anymore, she knows that Rosetta’s been taking measures to distance herself, and it scares her. Was it something she said? Was it something she did?

 

Before she can register it, the bowl clatters on the floor and she’s out the door, running somewhere, anywhere—

 

“—Yggdrasil!”

 

Io’s doing her best to catch up to her as far as her little legs can go, using magic to close the distance. Before she knows it, she’s been pulled into a hug, and when her sobs rack her frame, Io is there to support her with a strong embrace that belies her small hands.

 

“Yggdrasil,” she says, “Tell us what’s wrong! Are you okay?”

 

Yggdrasil leads her by the hand to her room, where she picks up a pen and draws a small Rosetta with a surprising amount of detail. Then next to it, she draws a few question marks, eventually covering the corners with them in such frustration that she actually tears the paper.

 

Io looks down. “So… you don’t know where Rosetta is. And you miss her?”

 

Words have never been applicable to Yggdrasil. As much as she wants to say it, it fits and it doesn’t. The mortal tongues are so hollow, but they can convey the depth of language as much as a single piece is indicative of the whole puzzle that it belongs to.

 

She nods, and the admitting it was enough to make vines twist around her, curling themselves in to protect from something invisible.

 

It hurts, but it’s not a physical hurt. She’s seen sorrow in people’s faces, and as Yggdrasil Malice, she’s even felt some of it, but that was alien. It wasn’t, it was never—this personal. She’s never felt this weak or helpless, and it scares her.

 

“Yggdrasil…” Io says, letting her name hang in the air, and she looks like she’s made her mind. Giving her a fleeting hug, she rushes out the door. “Wait for me!”

 

Yggdrasil lies in bed until Io comes back, tossing and turning. When she returns in the evening, Io’s face is marked in crestfallen defeat, and Yggdrasil prepares for the worst.

 

Does she hate me, she wants to ask, and Io’s somehow picked up on that, because she shakes her head.

 

“No, no! Rosetta wanted me to tell you that she doesn’t hate you. Actually,” Io says, her frown growing ever deeper, “Rosetta says that the problem is herself, and she needs to stay away from you. She wouldn’t tell me why, even when I told her that’s not how a real lady acts. But that’s Rosetta for you, isn’t it. Always so secretive…”

 

That Rosetta has never been Yggdrasil’s Rosetta, but Io sighs in a manner that’s more disappointed and less surprised.

 

Io slumps on the bed, and Yggdrasil moves to catch her. “Really, I don’t know what to do with her. Can’t she at least tell you why? Because if she doesn’t, then it just hurts you more. When my teacher disappeared… I felt the same way...”

 

She buries her face into Yggdrasil’s shoulder, letting out a muffled scream, breath warm on her skin.

 

Yggdrasil doesn’t know what to do besides hold her for the rest of the night.

  
  
＊  


 

Yggdrasil begins to leave lotuses for Rosetta every evening, extra ones that Lennah lends her after they’ve made their wreaths last with magic. Io does her best to get Rosetta to talk to her, but for now it’s to no avail.

 

That is, until a single white camellia is left on her room’s desk one night. Yggdrasil holds it close to her, smelling Rosetta and nothing but.

 

She has her answer. _Wait for me when the wedding ends._

 

Yggdrasil knows that as a primal time is of no object, but she can’t wait to see Rosetta again. The next day, she gives Io an entire bouquet of pink roses, asking her to pass it on. Io tries to ask why, but Yggdrasil shooes her away.

 

As Io closes the door, she’s smiling for the first time in a while.

 

＊  


The wedding day comes, and when Lyria guides Vira to meet Katalina at the altar, she cannot stop sobbing. Katalina smiles, eyes welling, and brushes Vira’s tears away. The air is heavy with tears cried and silent as they partake in their vows under an altar weaved with glowing morning glories.

 

Lennah holds Yggdrasil’s shoulder, a gesture of pride in the work they’ve done. There are flowers in every nook and cranny on the ship today, but not a single one of them looks out of place, accentuating the beauty of everyone in the room instead of overwhelming them.

 

Rose petals flutter gently, and before she turns, Yggdrasil feels as if she’s returned home.

 

“Hi,” Rosetta says in a calm, gentle, almost _shy_ voice. “It’s been a while, Yggdrasil. How have you been?”

 

Before Yggdrasil can think, her arms are around Rosetta, and she is caught with steady hands before they topple over. She feels Lennah drift away, likely smiling as kindly as she always does, and then they are alone.

 

Rosetta pushes her away, the smallest amount of distance she can afford just to look at Yggdrasil. “You’re beautiful,” she practically breathes out, and while Yggdrasil is appreciative of her face, a retort comes to her mind.

 

You always say that!

 

“Dear me,” Rosetta says with a chuckle. “I’m only stating the truth. You’ve always been quite the flower. I’m going to have to excuse the both of us before anyone comes for you!”

 

Though Rosetta says this jokingly, Yggdrasil feels as if she’s been hit home. And despite this, Yggdrasil feels glad. She’s missed this—she’s missed being _them._

 

Yggdrasil and Rosetta, Rosetta and Yggdrasil. No bond can sever them.

 

“I should explain,” Rosetta starts, “That I feel incredibly guilty for leaving you alone. Especially out of the blue, I should not have done that, as it hurt you and you wouldn’t even know why it happened, since I’d cut you off. I’m sorry, Yggdrasil.”

 

You’re forgiven, she conveys immediately.

 

Rosetta chuckles sadly. “Always been quick to forgive, haven’t you. You shouldn’t, you haven’t even heard my reasons.”

 

But I know you. And you wouldn’t do things without a reason, even if I don’t know what that reason was. Remember when you’d left with that one skyfarer?

 

“Ahh, of course. You did everything in your power to convince me to stay, and I didn’t even give you a proper reason until later. It was love, by the way. It’s the same reason as to why I avoided you until right now. I wanted to protect you.”

 

Protect me? From what? Yggdrasil’s head tilts, and bells chime. Rosetta, you’ve never done anything but save me.

 

“I know. But, wrapped in my own selfishness, I began to think… what if I had never met you? I thought, since coming to Lumacie, I’d done nothing but hurt you.”

 

Yggdrasil’s indignation exploded, and Rosetta had to take a step back.

 

“Yes… it was wrong, wasn’t it? Io came up to me, after all. Told me I wasn’t being a proper lady, and that I didn’t know how to use my brain. She was right,” Rosetta says, and laughs fully. “That girl is a lot smarter than most people give her credit for. I wouldn’t know what to do without her.”

 

Yggdrasil agrees, transmitting the feeling of when Io had held her that night. Rather than like us being her parents, she must be parenting us.

 

Rosetta hides a brimming smile behind her gloved hand. “Certainly, that seems to be the case. I have her to thank for letting me see the truth.”

 

The music begins to change, Novei’s orchestra amplifying the volume into a gentle allegro that everyone on the ship can hear. Wordlessly, Yggdrasil and Rosetta fall in step, twisting and turning with the rest of the dancers. As always, Rosetta is perfect, and Yggdrasil is struggling to catch up.

 

“You’ll get the hang of it, sweetie. Just follow me.”

 

Despite that, Yggdrasil nearly trips in these stupid heels, and Rosetta catches her yet again, steadying her.

 

“Would you like a drink?”

 

Yggdrasil’s face brightens at the promise of apple juice, and Rosetta delivers. Sipping at it happily as they sit next to one another, she lets Rosetta know she has a question that she wants answered.

 

Yggdrasil wonders how Rosetta even came to the conclusion that she was hurting Yggdrasil in the first place. Rosetta looks surprised, but she looks in the direction of the altar and she understands.

 

Rosetta doesn’t need to say it, but she does anyway. “When I saw the strengths of Katalina and Vira’s devotion to each other, I wondered if I was too close to you. If I even had the right to be.”

 

Vira’s image of Katalina remains in Yggdrasil’s mind. Maybe humans and primals aren’t so different after all.

 

“When the Erste Prime Minister came, she used that horrible essence on you, transformed you into something you didn’t want to be.” Yggdrasil shudders, the painful memory threatening to tear into her, only steadied by Rosetta’s warm fingers intertwining with her cold ones. “I thought that I was the one to bring misfortune into your forest. Just like my old home was taken from me, I thought I would be the one to destroy the forest you so loved.”

 

Yggdrasil makes a face.

 

“Yes, yes, even if I had been helping you protect it. I was foolish. I didn’t notice that would happen. But I was scared of not being able to protect you.”

 

Yggdrasil pulls Rosetta’s arms into her hands, looks at her.

 

You came for me in the end.

 

“I did.”

 

And I’ll be fine if you’re always here with me.

 

Yggdrasil gives Rosetta her feelings, everything. From the fact that life is so inevitable as death is in the form of droughts and blazing forests. But Yggdrasil also shows her something more, she shows the first sapling that sprouts from barren lands. But… somehow, Yggdrasil doesn’t feel as if it’s enough, this time.

 

Something in her has changed since she’s arrived on the Grandcypher. Yggdrasil has never been given the desire to understand the human tongue. Her purpose is clear, she is meant to store the information of ages and little else.

 

But if she can’t convey something so important to Rosetta, what would her knowledge even mean?

 

Willfully, she picks up Rosetta’s hand, overturning her palm and resting it on her lap. Slowly, carefully, she conveys the words “I love you,” by tracing the shapes with her fingers.

 

When she is done, there are tears in Rosetta’s eyes, ones that she wipes away as she starts laughing with her full body, arms clutching her stomach until she calms down.

 

“You’re right, you absolutely are. We can’t avoid bad things, can we? Bad times always come, but we can always make sure to stay together out of love. That’s the truth of our life, isn’t it?”

 

Yggdrasil nods, her head bobbing up and down in joy.

 

It’s why I developed an interest in the outside world, Rosetta. It was because of you.

 

“Me? You’re flattering me,” Rosetta says, well aware that it is not flattery.

 

It’s true. I felt… lonely. I wanted to experience this journey with you. I missed you. I love you. When you said you would retire with me in Lumacie, spending the rest of your days with me… I felt so happy. I’d never known what to call it, not until I met these mortals. Learned their language. I can suddenly convey so many things to you, Rosetta. I want to share them with you as you’ve shared with me, ever since I met you washed up on the banks of that lake in Lumacie.

 

Rosetta smiles, soft and sincere. “Is that so. Then, I’ll have to return the favor again, won’t I? To make things fair to you. I’ll make you the happiest girl in the world, Yggdrasil. If you would let me.”

 

There’s no need. You already have.

 

“You make me the happiest, too.”

 

Yggdrasil takes her hand and drags her to the dance floor, and for the rest of the night Yggdrasil notices nothing but the flowers, their steps, and each other.

**Author's Note:**

>  ~~please consider writing for this ship my crops are dying~~  
>   
> 
> thank you for reading! kudos and comments are always appreciated, and have a nice day!  
> 


End file.
